Yesterday, Tomorrow and Fantasy
by LovelyLittleFreckle
Summary: A small, fluffy one-shot that I wrote for my girls at the Lizzington Facebook page! I don't own any of the characters, of course, but here's a fic based on a dream I had a few nights ago. I hope you enjoy!


Life as Raymond Reddington's partner was not always gunfire and espionage, Liz was coming to find. She had been accompanying him during her free time between assignments; sometimes at his insistence and sometimes out of curiosity, but always the great expense of her preconceived notions about the man himself. On this trip however, she found herself unusually baffled, at a loss for how to integrate this experience into her casual profile of his personality.

Perhaps it was the need for something to balance out the life of crime to which he had so easily and entirely adapted. The family issues were almost too obvious an explanation. Knowing Red, it probably had something more to do with the beignets and the people watching.

"Is this all you do?" she asked, taking a long sip of her coffee. The puzzle had finally gotten the best of her. They had been sitting on the fastidiously decorated outdoor patio for almost an hour now, sipping their coffee and taking in the scenery. Intermittently Red's foot tapped along with the music, a smile spreading across his face.

"Well this isn't _all_ I do, but this is the part I enjoy the most," he answered.

"You get an annual pass when you live on another coast… just to come here and do this," she asked rhetorically, gesturing past them at the people walking by in large groups. "There has to be more to it than this."

"I like to just come and take in the scenery, the history, the amazing attention to detail… it's absolutely stunning."

The question occurred to her _Why doesn't he just actually go to New Orleans? Why come here to a simulacrum of the city instead?_

She hadn't been here since she was very small; she barely remembered any of the attractions that they had seen listed on the display board out front. Liz took a moment to follow his lead. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, ignoring her other senses as she took in the sounds around them. She could hear the faint whistling noise of the ticket counters near the front gate, greeting each new guest as they walked through. There was the clanging but delicate bell on the Disneyland Express, signaling its arrival in New Orleans Square, right behind them. She had expected to hear the yelling and squealing of children, but instead found it subtly over-taken by the sound of jazz music, piping onto the patio of the little café where they'd been sitting.

She felt a little itch of excitement rising in her chest when a string of memories came back to her suddenly but vividly. Something about the music lead her to remember a little pathway that led to a small building, surrounded by torches and deep chanting voices… it had to have been around here somewhere.

"Isn't there a little show around here? Like… you go in and there's music and tropical birds?" Liz asked.

Red looked over at her and laughed heartily, taking a final sip of his coffee and crinkling the empty bag of beignets in his hand.

"What?" Liz said, looking at him incredulously. "Am I making that up?"

"No, I'm afraid you're not. I've never been there myself but I think you're referring to the Enchanted Tiki Room."

"Yes! The little birds come down from the ceiling and they sing!" she said, letting her voice become higher in pitch, excited by the confirmed memory. "I remember going in there and being absolutely terrified at first, until Sam explained that they weren't real birds."

"How young were you that you thought someone had trained birds to talk?"

"I was very young. And I watched a lot of cartoons thanks to Walt Disney himself, thank you very much, so in my mind anything was possible."

Red got up from his chair and outstretched his hand to her, offering it to hold. A few times in their adventures he had taken her hand, and on occasion he had stroked her back affectionately and each time she found herself not wanting him to stop. Eagerly, she took his hand again and he led her off the patio, toward the walkway full of people. Perhaps she was self-conscious but she felt like she could sense eyes on them as they strolled… Red struck a dapper figure amongst the tourists and parents dressed for utility and people turned their heads to look at him accordingly. It was early morning but nearing 75 degrees already and he barely broke a sweat in his three piece suit… and it seemed like everyone took notice.

They neared the little shack surrounded by an intentionally crude fence and he held the little gate open for her. Beautifully carved figures with little name tags took turns introducing themselves by name in the courtyard where Red and Liz found themselves alone. The growling voices of the figures were kind but imposing in the recordings that were probably done years and years ago.

A man in a Hawaiian shirt approached them and let them into the hut, greeting them enthusiastically but explaining that it would probably just be the two of them. "The Tiki Room doesn't get too much traffic until the weather gets a bit hotter. You don't mind do you?" They didn't.

The dark the room was nothing impressive yet, as they found a spot in one of the back rows of bench seats facing the middle of the room. It was coming back to her now, the memories becoming more concrete – the little tiki faces that adorned the walls would sing to them, if she remembered correctly. Red sat nearest the wall, taking a moment to look at the faces carved there and run his fingers over them.

"I don't think you're supposed to touch them," she said. In response, like a child, he looked at her in the dim light and tapped his finger on one of the tiki's eyes, defiantly. She swatted him on the shoulder and he stopped, slipping his hand over her knee instead of causing more trouble. She felt a small thrill as the bare skin of his hand touched the hem of her skirt and she found herself glad that it was too dark for him to see her blush.

He flinched only slightly in surprise as a spotlight came on, illuminating a brightly colored parrot that began talking to them, yawning itself awake as though it had been sleeping. _Awww, what is this senorita, my siestas are getting chorter and chorter!_

She moved closer to Red, touching her shoulder to his until he lifted his arm and placed it around her. She missed a few of the birds introducing themselves as she took a moment to rest her cheek against the fine fabric of his suit, finally looking up to see the whole room lit up.

When she was a child she remembered being completely overcome and slightly terrified by the experience of seeing the birds descend from the rafters and the flowers' animatronic mouths clacking as their lips kept time with the music. This time she simply felt awed by the little details. Each bird, each flower, each tiki face intricately painted and constructed and made to last through the years. The windows were rigged to make it look like there was actually a rain storm raging outside in the southern California summer. She found herself singing faintly along with their songs, but taking a moment to look up at Red's face.

The lights from the show passed across his upturned face, betraying a small but childlike smile as he watched the birds sing. She could have sworn she saw his lips move just slightly, mouthing the words to the song.

In the darkness as the birds finished their finale, she lifted her head from his shoulder. They smiled at each other in the dim light and even for all of their little vacations together, it was the most comfortable she had ever felt around him. She seized the moment knowing that there would never be another quite like it and pressed her lips to his, letting them linger long enough to take in the soft warmth of his mouth. His fingers pushed her hair back from her face as she felt his lips smile under hers.

"Now… can we go see Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln?" she asked.

"How about we do that after we've solved the mystery of your preoccupation with animatronics?" he said, taking her hand to help her up.

"Alright. I'll settle for Pirates of the Caribbean but that's my final offer," she said playfully.

"Another dark, semi-private attraction. I think I see where this is going… and me without my chapstick."

She slapped his shoulder again as she followed him into the daylight and out into the world of fantasy.


End file.
